the rest of us, for what we feel is necessary, when 

 loosed in the fields and woods, is to have those 

 blank misgivings of the creature that moved 

 about in worlds not realized. We have them, 

 too, many of them, and exceedingly blank ones. 

 Misgivings, of course, the naturalist will have. 

 But he never hunts for them, not the blank 

 species anyway. Nor does the poet. We think 

 of Coleridge and Wordsworth tramping the 

 Quantock Hills together seeking ecstasies and 

 verses as we should seek heather and daisies. 

 Far from it. A poet rarely has his raptures 

 out-of-doors ; and he never runs one down. He 

 roams the hills, seeing things. When he returns 

 and begins to think about them, then he drinks 

 the divine draught. 



I gazed — and gazed — but little thought 

 What wealth the show to rae had brought, 



says, the poet, then adds : 



For oft, when on my couch I lie 

 In vacant or in pensive mood, 



They flash upon that inward eye 

 Which is the bliss of solitude ; 



And then my heart with pleasure fills, 



And dances with the daffodils. 

 [166] 



